7th Pay Commission: Cabinet to take up pay hike by January end

New Delhi: The Cabinet is likely to take up the pay hike over the recommendations of the 7th Pay Commission for the central government employees by the end of January.

FM Arun Jaitley had promised to hike minimum pay after discussions with all stakeholders, efforts would be made to fulfill the same.

A senior official of Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) said the proposal of the National Anomaly Committee will be endorsed by the Empowered Committee of Secretaries headed by Cabinet Secretary P K Sinha and the Department of Expenditure, the government think tank, after consultations. The decision is likely to be announced by the end of January.

A key objective of the proposal is the fitment factor for basic pay will be raised to 3.00 times, instead of the present 2.57 times as approved by the Cabinet on June 29.

“The idea behind such a move is the dissatisfaction of the central government employees unions over the inadequate hike in basic pay in accordance to the pay panel recommendations.,” the official said.

The 7th Pay Commission, led by Justice A K Mathur, earlier proposed minimum basic pay from Rs 7,000 to Rs 18,000 per month while the maximum basic pay from Rs 80,000 to Rs 2.5 lakh, which have been paid with arrears, effective from January 1, 2016.

The central government employees unions are demanding for hiking minimum pay Rs 18,000 to Rs 26,000 and the and asked to raising fitment factor 3.68 times from 2.57 times.

Hence, the government has formed National Anomaly Committee headed by Secretary, Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) in September, 2016 to look into pay anomalies arising out of the implementation of the 7th Pay Commission’s recommendations.

The National Anomaly Committee had raised some issues in its comments on the draft notes in its earlier meetings, but they have now been resolved with consultations all its stakeholders, the official said.

“The further meeting of National Anomaly Committee (NAC) is likely to be held in October to confirm to hike the basic pay with fitment factor 3.00,” the official said.

“Since, the The Finance minister Arun Jaitley had promised to hike minimum pay after discussions with all stakeholders, efforts would be made to fulfill the same,” the official said.

If the 2.57 fitment factor is tinkered with fitment factor 3.00, then salary and pension in general for all central government employees will go up, he assured.